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Updated: Aug 5, 2026

Self-assembling Morphologies Obtained from Helical Polycarbodiimide Copolymers and Their Triazole Derivatives
Published on: February 7, 2017
Morphological regulation of a flower-like hollow β-cyclodextrin covalent organic frameworks for enhanced
Liqin Cao1, Mengxue Tang1, Keyan Chen1
1Department of Analytical Chemistry, China Pharmaceutical University, Nanjing, 210009, China; Key Laboratory of Drug Quality Control and Pharmacovigilance, Ministry of Education, Nanjing, 210009, China.
Background:
The development of chiral drug analysis methods is the foundation for evaluating drug efficacy and safety. Chiral covalent organic frameworks (CCOFs) show great potential as the chiral stationary phases (CSPs) due to their structural tunability and high stability. However, the inherent hydrophobicity of CCOFs limits their application in capillary electrochromatography (CEC).
Results:
This study reported the precise morphological regulation of 6-deoxy-6-mercapto-β-cyclodextrin covalent organic frameworks (SH-β-CD COFs). By controlling synthesis parameters, two distinct structures were successfully prepared: a hierarchical flower-like hollow COF (HFH-SH-β-CD COF) and a spherical COF (S-SH-β-CD COF). The flower-like hollow structure exhibited superior hydrophilicity and dispersibility. Combined with bond defect functionalization (BDF) property, a high-performance CSP for CEC was developed via the photopolymerization method, achieving baseline separation of four fluoroquinolone antibiotics and four amino acids. This performance was not achieved using the S-SH-β-CD COF. Theoretical calculations help reveal the mechanism of chiral recognition.
Significance:
This work reveals a scientific correlation among the morphology, hydrophilicity, and chiral recognition performance of CCOF. It offers a new perspective for designing high-performance CSPs and expanding the platform for chiral drugs separation. Furthermore, the understanding of the chiral recognition mechanism inspires the design of materials with ideal performance.
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